


trying to fight gravity

by Anjali_Organna



Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Awkwardness, F/M, Pre-Canon, adolescent hijinks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-14
Updated: 2015-05-14
Packaged: 2018-03-30 13:20:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,916
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3938296
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anjali_Organna/pseuds/Anjali_Organna
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For a while, after his dad had been sent to prison, Iris is the only person whose touch Barry can tolerate.</p><p>[In which growing up in the same house with the girl you like would be a lot easier if said girl didn't keep touching you all the damn time. Or: Iris and Barry are ridiculously touchy-feely and confuse everyone around them but themselves the most.]</p>
            </blockquote>





	trying to fight gravity

**Author's Note:**

> This work was inspired by a) how physical Iris and Barry are with each other and b) my terrible love of the "growing up together" trope. Give me aaaaaallll the stories of their awkward adolescence together, I need them like burning. 
> 
> Title from Ani DiFranco's Falling Is Like This.

For a while, after his dad had been sent to prison, Iris is the only person whose touch Barry can tolerate. He resists all attempts at a hug, a friendly arm around the shoulders by the cops, by psychiatrists, by Joe. He knows this hurts Joe, can see it in his eyes, but he feels like accepting comfort from an adult who isn’t his father is somehow a betrayal. And anyways, Joe doesn’t believe Barry, which is all Barry can focus on at first. 

Iris is different. For one thing, she’s incredibly stubborn: she refuses to let Barry shut her out. But more than that, she has an instinctive understanding of when Barry really does need to be left alone and when she should ignore him and sit with her arms wrapped around him as he weeps. Or when he needs to rest his head on her lap as he goes over everything that occurred the night his mother died, again and again. Listens patiently, her hands stroking his hair, as he tries to figure out what happened.

In those first terrible months, when there is no space left in Barry for anything other than his grief and confusion and guilt and rage, he doesn’t even really register that Iris is the girl he has a crush on. The most he can manage is a feeling of great comfort in her presence; he feels safe with her. Before, he would have been mortified at the thought of crying in front of her, but now, he’s anchored by the weight of her familiar shape next to him. The world has turned upside-down and he can hardly recognize anything, but at least Iris remains the same.

In time, he comes to relax around Joe, grows to love him like a second father. And as Barry gets older, he understands that he can’t entirely blame Joe for not believing him: Barry might not have believed it himself, if it had happened to anyone else.

Of course, _Iris_ has always believed.

*

Iris’s own mother had died of a sudden burst brain aneurysm when Iris was seven. Iris doesn’t remember much--Joe said later that her mom had been complaining of a headache in the days before but there was nothing that warned them anything was seriously wrong. One morning, she’d dropped Iris off at school, kissing her goodbye, and then later that afternoon, Iris’s grandmother had arrived, looking years older. Iris would find out later that her mother had collapsed at work. By the time she was rushed to the hospital, it was too late.

So Iris can understand, a little, what Barry is going through. She can’t relate to the trauma of witnessing a murder, but she understands what it’s like to have the ground shift dramatically under you with no warning. To go from having a mother in the morning to not having one that evening. 

Later, she will realize that this shared trauma is part of what makes the two of them cling together so tightly. Adults tend to treat the grief of children gingerly, wanting to protect them from their own emotions. Or they tried to over-empathize, showing that they _really understand_ and _really care._

But Barry trusts in the genuineness of Iris’s emotions; he knows that she can relate. And he knows that she will listen to whatever he has to say, will allow him to sort out his own emotions and reactions in his own time, in his own way. Iris wants nothing for Barry except his own comfort.

And though she’s never directly told Barry this, he provides her with something in return: someone else to focus on, something that isn’t her father and the empty spaces in their house where her mother used to exist.

Iris needs Barry just as much as he needs her. No wonder, then, that she holds onto him just as hard.

*

Puberty finally ensnares Barry around age fifteen. He shoots up nearly a foot and spends a good three months tripping over everything as his brain adjusts to his body occupying so much more space.

Barry doesn’t mind being taller; he enjoys lording it over Iris, enjoys propping an elbow on top of her head or shoulder and leaning down on her, laughing when she shoves him off. She’s been taller than him their entire lives--it’s nice to finally not be shorter than the girl he’s been dreaming about since forever.

What he _doesn’t_ like is the loss of control he has over his own body sometimes when he’s around her: how he can catch sight of her in certain light or from certain angles and it’s like he’s been winded. Breaking out into a sweat, his heart beating faster, and then there’s the portion of his lower anatomy that really _does_ seem like it has a mind of its own. And the thing is, most other guys don’t have nearly the same amount of proximity to the girl they’re in love with as Barry does. They don’t have the same amount of chances for complete and utter humiliation.

Exhibit A: He learns to avoid being upstairs when Iris is taking a shower. It’s not a good idea to be anywhere near when she might come out of the bathroom wrapped in a towel, skin damp and glowing.

He buys her a robe for Christmas, a big, fluffy, terry-cloth thing that covers her from her neck down to her toes. She _ooohs_ when she opens the package, saying, “Barry, that’s so thoughtful of you.”

“Yeah, well,” he says, ducking his head and avoiding eye contact. “You didn’t have one, so I thought…”

The robe helps. The problem doesn’t go away entirely; he’s only too aware that she’s naked underneath. But at least it’s enough so that he doesn’t have to keep fleeing to his bedroom or downstairs every time she exits the bathroom.

Barry checks out several books on meditation from the library, and hopes his uncontrollable reaction to her is a phase that he’ll be able to outgrow.

*

Several weeks before junior prom, Iris is studying for a math final in the living room. She’s been at it for a few hours now and has coped by moving progressively around the room, hoping that changing up positions will help her concentrate. She’s currently sitting on the floor opposite the couch, her notebooks and textbook strewn about the coffee table in front of her.

The front door bangs open. Wind from outside ruffles her papers and threatens the pages of her textbook; without looking up she yelps, “Shut the door, Barry!”

He does. “How’d you know it was me?”

“I always know when it’s you,” she says absently, preoccupied with making sure none of her notes had gone flying.

“Is that for pre-Calc?” he asks. “You don’t need to worry. It wasn’t so bad.”

She looks up at him, annoyed. “How do you remember a test you took _last year?”_

He grins down at her cheerfully. “I remember being surprised it was so easy.”

“Don’t make me throw something at you,” she grumbles, rolling her eyes at him. His smile widens. He reaches up to grab the wooden ceiling beam above his head and leans forward a little bit, his long torso stretching. His sweater rides up over his hips, exposing a strip of bare skin across his abdomen. Iris blinks and looks away.

She’s been studying for too long, she tells herself. Her brain is half-fried. That must be the reason why it had momentarily gone on the fritz at the sight of _Barry’s hipbones_ , of all things. How ridiculous.

She pushes up from the floor and heads to the kitchen in search of snacks. Barry trails along after her. “Lemme guess,” he says, “you’re about to break out the Nutella.”

Iris listens carefully, but there’s no sign in his voice that he’d noticed her looking at him. She says shortly, “Don’t make fun of the Nutella. It’s brain food.”

“I can tell you categorically that it’s not,” he says, crowding behind her. “At least put it on a banana or something.” Iris elbows him in the stomach and he backs up a little. She opens the jar of Nutella and dips the spoon in, then takes a long, slow lick, her eyes on him. “No banana.”

Barry steps away, rubbing the back of his neck. “Right. Okay. I’ll just...leave you to it, then.” He retreats out of the kitchen, leaving her in peace.

And that might have been the end of it for Iris, except then junior prom happened.

They go in a group of friends and it’s fun, at least as much as these events ever are. Most of the group are actually friends of Iris, but nobody questions when Barry is included as well--people are used to seeing Barry wherever Iris is. She dances the slow dances with whoever happens to be closest to her at the time, and once it happens to be Barry.

Iris and Barry have danced together before, of course, and she fits comfortably into his arms. Normally they pass the time by joking about everything going on around them but tonight Iris is wearing a dress with a very low back. The feeling of his hands sliding across her bare skin as they move together, fingers tracing lightly up her spine, gives her pause. 

“Are you okay?” Barry asks, concern written on his face. One of his hands flexes, spreading out flat against her back as he straightens up and looks at her.

“I--no,” Iris says. “I mean, yes. I’m fine. Just a little overheated.” She makes a show of fanning herself.

“Do you want to go outside?”

Iris shakes her head, forcing a smile. “No, really, it’s fine. I’m fine.” She starts talking about the dance moves some boy across the room is making, directing Barry’s attention away from her, and is able to finish out the rest of the dance without incident.

It’s just hormones, she tells herself, and the fact that they _are_ so close, and spend so much time together. For god’s sake, she’s seen _way_ more of Barry than just that little flash of skin, felt his hands around her waist a million times, and she’s never before reacted in any way. It’s all just in her head. She needs to forget it ever happened. There’s no reason for her to make things weird.

The DJ plays “We are Family” towards the end of the night and she and Barry end up with their arms around each other, screaming along to the words, and Iris convinces herself that it’s just like it’s always been.

*

There are after-parties when prom is over, but Barry and Iris are cop’s kids and are under strict orders to come straight home. Joe stays up long enough to ensure that they’re back safe, asking how the night was, before he crashes, leaving the two of them to their own devices. Barry takes off his suit, puts on pajamas, and wanders out into the hall.

Iris has also changed out of her dress, a long, slinky number with a high neckline and no back to speak of that had made Barry lose his breath when she’d first turned around. She’s in the bathroom, pulling pins out of her hair and Barry leans on the doorframe, watching the pile grow steadily bigger. “How many are in there?”

She tugs and swears. “About a million.” He says quietly, “Here, let me.” She stops and squints at him for a moment, then sort of shrugs. “Have at it.”

He motions her over to the toilet seat, turning her sideways so her back is to him. Barry begins threading his fingers through her hair, searching for pins, and for a while the only sound in the room is their breathing, steady and slow, and the clink of pins as he sets them down on the counter. He can see Iris relaxing, the tension easing out of her shoulders, and she sways sleepily a couple times. He finishes by running his hands through the full length of her hair, checking for any last pins. She sighs and leans against his chest, tilting her head back to look up at him. “Thanks.”

Barry very carefully doesn’t move against her. He settles his hands on her shoulders and squeezes lightly. “Any time.”

They stay frozen like that for one searing moment longer. Barry thinks that she must be able to feel the erratic booming of his heart, so close to her. Just as he thinks _What the hell_ and opens his mouth to speak, she stands up, gathering the pins from the counter and holding them tightly in one hand.

“Well,” she says and smiles brightly. “It’s late. I’d better…”

His hollow “Yeah” follows her out of the bathroom.

*

Three weeks into senior year, Barry finally gets a girlfriend. Iris quite literally watches it happen.

They’re at a party, which in and of itself is a little unusual, but this being senior year and all, Iris had convinced Barry to go. Naturally, they have curfew, which neither intends on breaking, and there is no way either of them will risk Joe’s wrath by drinking (Iris is positive he will carry through on his threat to breathalyze them both if he catches even a whiff of alcohol). But still, it’s fun to hang out and kick back and watch their classmates make increasingly amusing fools of themselves.

The kid who’s hosting has a karaoke machine, much to the dismay of Iris’s eardrums. She’s not entirely sure how it happens, but somehow Barry gets dragged up to sing with some of their friends, and then. And then.

The song is something by Jason Mraz or Dave Matthews or Jack Johnson, because of course it is. The other people with Barry are mostly tipsy and mostly yelling, so it’s a surprise to the rest of the party when halfway through it becomes apparent that Barry is actually singing. And the song--it’s totally the type of slow-but-not-too-slow romantic song that makes someone with a decent voice sound even better, and Barry--Barry has a better-than-decent voice. It’s not like he’s gonna be on Broadway any time soon, but still--boy can sing.

Iris watches as around the room, girls’ heads go popping up, angling for a better look at the person responsible. At first she’s amused, because this is _Barry_ and her frame of reference for him singing is every winter when the two of them screech out Christmas carols to annoy Joe. (She’s also caught him singing in the shower a few times, but you know. That’s the _shower._ Everyone sings in the shower.) It’s not like she didn’t know he could carry a tune. She just...never really thought that it was something anyone would find particularly interesting.

When the song is over, there’s practically a beeline for him, led by Becky Cooper and all of her friends. Iris doesn’t really know any of them and she watches, eyes narrowed, as the girls drape themselves all over him, cooing and asking _where_ he learned to sing like that and does he play any instruments and oh, he should _totally_ start a band.

Barry looks completely bewildered and he meets Iris’s eyes over the crowd, his face comical in its confusion. Becky strokes his shoulder admiringly and Iris tells herself that the twinge she feels is out of concern for Barry--she doesn’t want him to get hurt. Naturally.

*

Somewhat agonizingly, Barry has to get used to telling people that he and Iris aren’t a thing. Part of it is that she’s such a tactile person, always leaning on him or linking arms with him or squeezing his shoulders. If she were like that with everyone, it might not be as noticeable, but she’s not. She _doesn’t_ touch other people the way she touches him, and that had been enough to give him hope, once.

Barry’s college roommates are totally baffled when she comes to visit. They’d known what she looks like, of course, since Barry’s desktop is a photo of the two of them and he’s got another framed photo of them with Joe from their high school graduation on his desk. Even so, they’re a little blown away by Iris in person--she’s so bubbly and cheerful and genuinely eager to hear all about their lives--and they watch Barry and Iris’s interactions like anthropologists observing a newly discovered society.

“Dude,” Dave says, “ I knew she was hot, but I didn’t know she was _that_ hot.”

“Don’t hit on Iris,” Barry says warningly. “She didn’t come here for that.”

“But I mean, it’s not like you guys are together, right? She’s like your sister?”

“She is _not_ my sister, and don’t hit on her!”

Dave raises his hands defensively. “Okay, okay, sorry, _jeez._ ”

She tags along to a couple of his English and sociology classes but flatly refuses to go to the higher-level physics and chem courses. She meets him afterwards, saying with fond resignation, “Go ahead, I know you want to tell me all about the amazing things you learned today.” They grab drinks at the student union and wander all over campus, arms linked, and Barry is _so happy_ to be back in her presence. Even the awkwardness that arises when someone asks how long they’ve been together is negated by the happy way Iris says, “Oh no, we’re best friends,” as though to her _best friends_ is the height of relationship goals.

He asks carefully whether she’s dating anyone, and she shrugs carelessly and says, “Nah, I’m too busy, and besides, every guy I meet is so boring.” Her eyes are clear when she says it, so Barry accepts that this is genuinely a thing that she’s not thinking much about. In the darkest recesses of night, he sometimes wonders if she’s still a virgin, and knows he will never ask. (Barry himself lost his sophomore year in an attempt to see if _that_ would help him move on from Iris. Spoiler alert: It doesn’t.)

At one point when she’s in the shower, Dave corners him, saying, “You guys _really_ aren’t together?”

Barry runs his hands through his hair in exasperation. “No. Stop talking about it.”

“But,” and the face Dave is making would be laughable if only he were talking about something else, “but the way you guys are together… I mean, you’re, like, always touching each other!”

“Let it go,” Barry says shortly, walking away.

The night before she leaves, they stay up talking way too late given Barry’s 8:00 AM math class the next morning. Iris is toying with applying to the police academy and asks Barry what he thinks. He considers for a moment before saying, “I think you’d make a good cop. You’re smart and curious and determined. But that’s not the problem here.”

She sighs. “Joe.”

“Yeah. He’s not gonna like it.”

“God,” Iris says. “I love him, but he’s just so…”

“You can’t really blame him, Iris,” Barry says. “He sees awful stuff every single day. It’s understandable that he’d want to protect you from that.”

“He didn’t even blink when you said you were thinking about forensics,” Iris points out. “If you do that, you’ll be rooting around in crime scenes all day.”

“‘Rooting around?’” he queries, chuckling.

She punches him on the arm and he ducks away, still chuckling. “You know what I mean.”

“Yeah. But I’m not his daughter, Iris.”

She sighs again. “If he had it his way, he’d keep me locked in a little box forever.”

And Barry does sympathize with her, he _does._ But part of him also doesn’t blame Joe for wanting to keep Iris safe, at any cost. He’s lost people before. He doesn’t even want to think about losing her.

*

Iris had thought that there would be nothing more horrifying than watching Barry code over and over again, but in a way, the months of stillness that follows is even worse. At least before, his body was reacting to something, doing something. But this coma, where the steady beeping of the heart monitor is the only indication that he’s even still alive, is nearly unendurable. 

The worst is when she forgets, momentarily, and catches herself reaching for him, catches herself thinking, _Oh, I wonder what Barry will say about_ \--and then there’s the hard stop where reality comes crashing back.

She can feel the quiet leaching back into her life, into her father’s life. Barry’s absence hovers over everything they do, turning each conversation into a potential minefield as they navigate this new world where the sun shines less brightly, where other people’s happiness is something that threatens to choke her.

Despite how horrible it is to see him lying in STAR Labs, so unresponsive, she still goes as often as she can. She reads to him sometimes, funny news items she thinks he’d like or passages from her dissertation or even articles from the journals he subscribes to that still arrive at his apartment every month. Neither she nor Joe have had the heart to cancel them. 

And she’s reassured by the warmth she feels in his skin, when she takes his hand or touches his brow. Holds her palm against his chest, measures her breaths by the thumping of his heart.

It only happens once, but it’s enough to make her hope. The spark that passes between his hand to hers is unlike anything she’s ever felt before and she thinks that maybe it’s a sign. Maybe his body is recovering. Maybe he’ll wake up soon.

She asks Caitlin and Cisco about it, purposely waiting until Dr. Wells is out of the room. (It’s not that she doesn’t like Dr. Wells, exactly, she’s grateful that he offered to help. But sometimes he looks at her, like he knows something about her, and, well. It’s a little creepy.) Cisco and Caitlin immediately begin arguing about static electricity and Iris loses the thread of conversation after a couple minutes. But even though neither of them is able to tell her that the shock means anything, she is still comforted.

*

It’s not until he sees Iris again that Barry feels his disorientation start to subside. Her face upon seeing him--the shock and relief and overwhelming happiness--makes him feel both ten times taller and like a heel for causing her pain, all at once. She jumps into his arms and he crushes her against him, holding tight. 

She’s understandably freaked out, completely nervous about his health, and he thinks that he’ll have to listen to her side of the story at some point. Nine months. It’s the longest they’ve ever gone without speaking in the course of their relationship. Of course it was nothing to him; he can’t even begin to comprehend what it was like for her.

“Your heart kept stopping,” she says and he’s struck by the fear that’s still present in her eyes. Making her feel better is the only thing that matters. He takes her hand, pressing it against his chest. “It’s still beating,” he says. _For you,_ he doesn’t add, but he will, someday soon. It's been long enough.

In another moment the world will slow down in quite a different way, and he will be launched into a dizzying new life. But for right now, with Iris’s hand in his, against his heart, Barry is home.

**

**Author's Note:**

> A couple things: the show really hasn't been clear on what happened to Mama West but it's possible I'm ignoring something that was already stated. I am okay with this. Also I feel like I write young!Barry as more angry than the show has portrayed; I am also okay with this.


End file.
